The degenerate C. Neumann system I: symmetry reduction and convexity

The C. Neumann system describes a particle on the sphere S^n under the influence of a potential that is a quadratic form. We study the case that the quadratic form has l+1 distinct eigenvalues with multiplicity. Each group of m_\sigma equal eigenvalues gives rise to an O(m_\sigma)-symmetry in configuration space. The combined symmetry group G is a direct product of l+1 such factors, and its cotangent lift has an Ad^*-equivariant Momentum mapping. Regular reduction leads to the Rosochatius system on S^l, which has the same form as the Neumann system albeit for an additional effective potential. To understand how the reduced systems fit together we use singular reduction to construct an embedding of the reduced Poisson space T^*{S^n}/G into R^{3l+3}$. The global geometry is described, in particular the bundle structure that appears as a result of the superintegrability of the system. We show how the reduced Neumann system separates in elliptical-spherical co-ordinates. We derive the action variables and frequencies as complete hyperelliptic integrals of genus l. Finally we prove a convexity result for the image of the Casimir mapping restricted to the energy surface.Comment: 36 page

(Vanishing) Twist in the Saddle-Centre and Period-Doubling Bifurcation

The lowest order resonant bifurcations of a periodic orbit of a Hamiltonian system with two degrees of freedom have frequency ratio 1:1 (saddle-centre) and 1:2 (period-doubling). The twist, which is the derivative of the rotation number with respect to the action, is studied near these bifurcations. When the twist vanishes the nondegeneracy condition of the (isoenergetic) KAM theorem is not satisfied, with interesting consequences for the dynamics. We show that near the saddle-centre bifurcation the twist always vanishes. At this bifurcation a ``twistless'' torus is created, when the resonance is passed. The twistless torus replaces the colliding periodic orbits in phase space. We explicitly derive the position of the twistless torus depending on the resonance parameter, and show that the shape of this curve is universal. For the period doubling bifurcation the situation is different. Here we show that the twist does not vanish in a neighborhood of the bifurcation.Comment: 18 pages, 9 figure

A new integrable system on the sphere

We present a new Liouville-integrable natural Hamiltonian system on the (cotangent bundle of the) two-dimensional sphere. The second integral is cubic in the momenta.Comment: LaTeX, 15 page